Senate approves charter school bill

The Senate passed SB-8 yesterday. The bill removes the cap on charter schools and establishes a Public Charter Schools Commission to authorize and administer charter schools. Three Democrats, Linda Garrou (D-Forsyth), Ellie Kinnaird (D-Orange) and Malcolm Graham (D-Mecklenburg) joined 31 Republicans in supporting the bill.

The bill retains a provision requiring charter schools to “reasonably reflect” the racial and ethnic composition of the surrounding general population.

While many consider this a laudable goal, I do wonder how charter schools that are required to use lotteries to determine who gets admitted — basically any school that has more applicants than seats (There are about 20,000 students on charter school waiting lists.) — comply with such provisions.